Our Team
Hope Rugo, MD
Breast Oncologist
Clinical Professor, Medicine
Director, Breast Oncology Clinical Trials Program
Biography
Dr. Hope Rugo is a medical oncologist and hematologist specializing in breast cancer research and treatment. She joined the Breast Care Center in 1999 after a decade of experience at UCSF in malignant hematology and bone marrow transplantation for a variety of diseases, including breast cancer. She concentrates her efforts on breast cancer in order to provide the best treatment of women with the disease, incorporating novel treatments based on individual biology.
Dr. Rugo is the Director of the Breast Oncology Clinical Trials Program, and the principal investigator of multiple clinical trials focusing on combining novel targeted therapeutics with standard treatment to improve the treatment of both early and late stage breast cancer. In addition, she is working on studies to evaluate cognitive function in women receiving chemotherapy for breast cancer, as well as novel ways to reduce toxicity from therapy. Dr. Rugo has established collaborations with a number of other large academic medical centers for the purpose of expanding the novel therapies that are available for our patients, including herbal agents that appear to have an antitumor effect in the laboratory. She is an active member of the national cooperative group, CALGB, and a founding member of the Breast Cancer Research Consortium, and serves as well as an investigator in the UCSF Breast SPORE (the Bay Area Specialized Program of Research Excellence in Breast Cancer).
Dr. Rugo teaches medical students and physicians, and regularly lectures locally, nationally and internationally on subjects relating to the treatment of breast cancer. At UCSF, she runs the Breast Forum, an open monthly evening educational session for breast cancer patients, families and friends.
Since 1990, when Dr. Rugo joined the faculty at UCSF in the Division of Hematology and Oncology, she has been recognized for her excellence in both patient care and the teaching and training of medical students and physicians. She has received several awards including the Bank of America Gianini Foundation Award and a UCSF Clinical Cancer Center Investigator Research Program intra-mural award. In 2006, she was honored for her work in Breast Cancer Research by the Friends of the Breast Care Center.
Outside of work, Dr. Rugo spends time with her two children, Philip and Alyssa-Faith, and her husband Martin. Her outside interests include bicycling, hiking, travel with her family and playing the flute.
Education
University of Pennsylvania, MD, 1984
Residencies
Internal Medicine, UCSF, 1984-1987
Fellowships
Hematology/Oncology, UCSF, 1987-1990
Microbiology/Immunology, Stanford University, 1988-1990
